Where is the Senate Report?

It’s the start of the New Year and U.D.P. Senator Aldo Salazar has yet to present his draft report relating to the passport scandal.  Senator Salazar chaired the year-long hearings of the inquiry carried out by the Senate Special Select Committee into the findings of the Auditor General’s Special Audit Report on the Immigration and Nationality Department.  It’s been more than two years since the inquiry culminated in December 2017 and a report is yet to be furnished to the Committee.  Attorney Andrea McSweeney was contracted to assist the process, but it is the responsibility of the chair to complete a report.  Senator for the Unions, Elena Smith, says that Senator Salazar has promised, once again, to complete the report soon. 

Elena Smith

Senator Elena Smith, National President, B.N.T.U.

“I spoke to the Chairman when we had the last Senate meeting just recently in December, try to impress upon him the need for us to quickly move forward with that report. So he has promised that he will complete that report as soon as [possible, hopefully by this month so that then we can review his draft and make a decision whether we will accept it or add more stuff to what he has presented.”

Hipolito Novelo

“We have heard that promise before.”

Aldo Salazar

Senator Elena Smith

“I know but it is in the hands of the Chairman so we await his final report and his final draft and then we put a date on that. So he has promised that he will work on it and I will trust that he will do so.”

Hipolito Novelo

“Are you concerned that it has taken so long?”

Senator Elena Smith

“Yes, we are concerned but at the end of the day there is process and so we cannot circumvent that process as other members of the committee. The rules are very clear that the chairman presents the draft report and we go from there. So we have been pushing and it might not be in the public but we have been pushing him to see how quickly we can work on that and put that out because it is not fair it is not fair that we have gone through that, all of the questioning and documentation and not being able to present a report. It is going to look bad really on all of us, specifically the chairman, if we cannot present a report especially noting that election is coming up soon. People might want to think that we are holding it back because of elections and that kind of thing so the ball the in the chairman’s court and we await his presentation.”